The truth about running your own event as a business owner

Today’s episode of the podcast is all about the reality of what running an event looks like. In this episode I share my thoughts on the pros and cons of running an event, and the key things you need to know about the costs and logistics involved, that you need to consider if you want to run one.   KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCAST The pros and cons of having speakers Knowing how to choose the right price The pros and cons of getting sponsorship I'd be fascinated to hear your take on events - do you love them or are you not so keen? Please feel free to connect with me on socials and let me know! LINKS TO RESOURCES MENTIONED IN TODAY’S EPISODE Find out more and sign up for my Dream Business Live Event on 14th June Connect with Teresa on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter   Transcript You are listening to Your Dream Business podcast and I am your host, Teresa Heath Wareing. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the podcast. How's things? I hope you are doing well. I am recording this off the back of a very busy week and the start of many other busy weeks. And the reason my week was so busy last week is I had one of my in-person events and I have another one coming up in June, and I thought that would be a good topic for the podcast. Because often what people end up doing is, especially if they're a freelancer, one of their thoughts is to go and maybe teach to do the thing that they do as in like if they do social media that they might do an event to say, I'll teach you social media for the day. And they might have in-person events. And, and also, another event I went to when I was a speaker, one of the lunch discussions was around, whether or not, people want the in-person stuff, whether they'd prefer the Zoom stuff, whether they're sick of the Zoom stuff, and there were some really interesting responses that didn't quite match up to maybe what I thought. So this episode is gonna look at my thoughts on events, how I've managed my own events, kind of the pros and cons of doing them, and also kind of what came up in this discussion and what the reality of running an event looks like. So let me start by talking about the types of events I've done. Now, I have done two VIP retreats where I have taken people away for a number of days. We have hired a beautiful hotel and stayed away and worked in our businesses. And then I've done two in-person day events, both in Birmingham. Both at the same location, both fairly similar in structure, but different in terms of what I taught. And then obviously I have spoken at an absolute ton of events. So I have spoken at huge, massive conferences where I am one of many, many, many speakers. I have spoken at smaller events, I've spoken at masterminds, I've spoken at other people's kind of events where they're doing something similar to what I do. I have literally spoken. I've spoken at events where it is nothing to do with what I do. They just bring me in to speak. I've spoken at networking type events. I've done everything, like literally everything. As I often joke, my first sort of speaking stuff. When people asked me about how I got into speaking was in a play barn. For those of you who might not know what a play barn is, you are not missing out. But basically it's like a bull pit type play thing for kids. And I did a talk for Biz Mums and there was literally like three mums in there, in a play barn and me. So it was wild, as you can imagine. But I really have done everything kind of, oh, there's not much I can't think that I haven't done event-wise. And I've spoken at events in the UK, in Dubai, in Greece, in Cyprus, in the States, in Ireland. So again, I've had a really good mix of locations as to where I've spoke as well, which again, makes a bit of a difference. But anyway, this isn't about speaking. This is about what if you wanna run your own event and the truth about running events, and I'll tell you the truth about running mine. So let's start off with kind of the type of event I run. So my event is very different. So I run an event where it's about really working on your business and also, kind of spending that time focusing on you as a person as well, and making those connections. Now at this last event I just did in Birmingham, and I have one coming up in Newcastle in a few weeks, which this May episode may have gone out by then, I'm not sure. But one of the things I said to them, cause I was thinking like in the morning as I was getting ready that like I'm on the circuit, like the speaker circuit and there are some people that come to every single event that I've pretty much done in this industry because they are serial event joiners and they love an event. Absolutely fine. Nothing wrong with that. Great. But they don't sign up for mine. Now I could take that very personally and think they just don't like me, and that's all right. That's fine. But then I thought about it and thought. The difference with my event and a conference is that you have to work on your business. It's really easy to go to a conference and just sit there and watch speakers all day and have a lovely lunch and chat with people and do the party in the after party and all that jazz and say, I'm working on my business. When really, you just sat in a conference all day. Now some people will take what they've learned in that conference and they will run with it and do work with it, and they will, you know, really make the most of that time. Some people don't. Some people literally just have a lovely jolly day out and I just thought, I'm not gonna attract those people. The type of event I put on is not designed to attract those people because you have to work on your event and you have, sorry. You have to work on your business and you have to work on you, and you have to make those connections. It is about having conversations with people that you don't know and about getting to know those people and about speaking up when I ask you a question. So, that was the first thing that I found really interesting. And in one way I almost feel like, gosh, my ego must be so big when I run an event and it's just me, but it's not me as you know, come and hear me speak all day. It's me as a facilitator. It's me as a coach helping you do the work on your business. It's giving you an entire day out, whereas lots of events out there. And of course a lot of the events I speak at are speaker events. So let's just talk about the difference in that. And now the first thing is, I don't think I could run a speaker event. The logistics in that is unflipping believable. So, and I have friends who run events that have speakers, and I'm sure if I had them on to talk about it, they would agree with me. No end. That you've got to make sure you've got the right caliber of speaker, the right type of speaker, and the right kind of person to come and speak at your event because, It's your event with your name on it. So if you were to have some people come along and they weren't all that, then that's not gonna be great on you. The other thing with having speakers is you are relying on other people. I know that I just have to get ready my stuff for the times that I need them. I am only responsible to myself really. Whereas if I have other speakers, and it always blew my mind, like when someone says to me, I need you talking for this date, they always get it in for that date. And if I was them, I would always make that date sooner than when I actually needed it. But it blows my mind how, and I've spoken to many event organizers, how speakers don't get their talks in. Like until days before or even on the day and it's like, what the hell, man, I could, I'd literally have a breakdown. I couldn't cope with that. So personally, even though sometimes those speakers will bring in other people and those speakers promote your event as well. So even though that can help with sales, for me, I just couldn't cope with the stress of that. I couldn't cope with managing other people. Maybe one day. I'm not gonna say never. You know, when I have a team to organize that and I don't have to do anything to do with it, then maybe, but I don't, I can't see it being a thing I ever offer, to be honest. So let's talk about some of the pros about having an in-person event. So some of the pros for me are that connection piece. Now I do a huge amount of work online and obviously I'm Zoom all the time, but nothing can be being sat in a room with someone and literally being physically in the same room, having conversation. We all know what it's like on Zoom when we're trying to have a conversation and if someone talks over someone else, it kind of cuts them off or it silences them, or it's really hard to, to take those social cues where it's much easier in person. So for me, the people who have met at my in-person events have built really long lasting and solid friendships and business friendships and business connections. So that is...